Children wade in the water with cargo ships at anchor in the background and a fisherman nearby, in the Strait of Hormuz off Bandar Abbas, Iran, Tuesday, June 30, 2026. (Amirhosein Khorgooi/ISNA via AP)
Iran on June 30 said a technical delegation will travel to Doha to follow up on the release of frozen Iranian funds as conflicting reports emerged from Tehran and Washington over a new round of talks.
Qatar’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Majed Al Ansari confirmed that U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were in Doha for talks with Qatari mediators and officials but stressed that the meetings were not intended for direct negotiations with Iran.
“Mr. Steve Witkoff and Mr. Jared Kushner are here in Doha to meet with mediators, with Qatari officials, and the talks will be around all regional issues,” Ansari said.
The spokesman said discussions would include Iran as well as other regional issues, including Lebanon, but added, “They are not here for their negotiations with the Iranians.”
He explained that Iran’s technical delegation travels to and from Doha depending on the progress of negotiations and that no senior Iranian delegation is currently in Qatar.
According to Ansari, the technical discussions involve lower-ranking officials working on nuclear, economic and security issues under the memorandum of understanding reached by Washington and Tehran.
The talks on frozen Iranian assets are expected to focus on the transfer of $6 billion out of roughly $12 billion in blocked Iranian funds, an arrangement that Qatari officials have previously said could be agreed between Washington and Tehran.
Qatar has taken on a more active mediating role in recent weeks following an initial April ceasefire brokered by Pakistan, after previously declining to mediate while under Iranian bombardment during the conflict that erupted on Feb. 28.
Meanwhile, the U.N. trade and development agency warned on Tuesday that while the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz will bring immediate relief to energy markets, vulnerable economies remain at risk from
prolonged increases in food and fuel costs.
Food and transport systems are likely to take longer than energy markets to recover, as disrupted supply chains need more time to reset following more than 100 days of severe disruption to shipping through the strategic waterway, a U.N. Conference on Trade and Development said in a new report.
The strait, which normally carries about one-fifth of global oil and gas supplies, was effectively paralyzed during the conflict triggered by joint US-Israeli strikes on Iran in late February.
Although Brent crude has fallen sharply back to around $73 a barrel, close to pre-conflict levels, following the interim US-Iran agreement, UNCTAD said higher fuel, gas and fertilizer costs could continue to feed through into agricultural production, transport costs and household budgets.
